(More) Evidence of Human Sacrifice from Crete?

A new discovery made during archaeological digs on the Greek island of Crete confirms the hypothesis, already advanced in the past, that over 3,000 years ago human beings, and not only animals, were sacrificed to local gods.

The site in which the artefacts were discovered is on the hill of Castelli near Splazia, in the area of the city of Chania, the second city of Crete on the north-western part of the island, built in 1252 at the order of the 44th Doge of Venice Marino Morosini over the ancient city of Cydonia.

The excavations led to the discovery of many tombs and ceramic vases from the Mycenaean period, buildings similar to Mycenaean palaces, frescoes from the Minoan era, fragments of a vase with linear B writing used in Mycenaean language, Roman statues, fragments of mosaics from Hellenic and Christian eras and animal and human bones including the skull of a young woman allegedly dating back to 1280 BC which would prove that humans were also sacrificed 3,000 years ago during religious rites, and not just animals.

The bones were discovered in the corner of a court outside which, according to the evidence found, was beside the royal palace of the city of Cydonia built like buildings from the Mycenaean period between 1375 and 1200 BC.

‘Under the stones placed in an ordered way we found what we expected: the skull of a young woman, not in one piece, amid animal skulls. It was broken, just like the others, with a strong blow to the forehead’, said archaeologist Maria Andreadakis-Vlazakis, director of antiquities and cultural heritage at the Greek culture ministry, who directs excavation work.

The artifacts show that an important settlement that would gradually become the city of Cydonia was already in the area in the Neolithic period, the researcher said at a conference on ‘Chania’ in the Minoan era’ held at the headquarters of Greece’s Association of archaeologists.

‘We believe the woman was killed during a human sacrifice and not of animals’, said Andreadakis, referring to the skull found. ‘We have not yet drawn the final conclusions, we need to study the bones much more closely. By the month of October however we will be ready to present the results at the international archaeology congress in Milan on the theme of human sacrifices in ancient history. The findings from excavations in Chania’ will be the main topic of the congress’.

Excavation work, involving the 25th Superintendency of classic antiquities in cooperation with the Swedish and Danish archeological institutes, have been ongoing since 2005 and the most important artifacts were discovered in 2012.

‘The presence of the human skull must not surprise us as Greek mythology is full of stories of sacrifices of virgins in an attempt made by society to ingratiate gods and confront great disasters’, said Andreadakis.

Now despite tales of the Minotaur, and the like, scholars of our generation(s) have tended to be skeptical of claims of human sacrifice among the Greeks, especially the folks on Crete. I don’t think we have a scholarly consensus yet, but folks might want to peruse news reports from the past which mention other finds which might make you go hmmmmm:

From 1979 from Heraklion (this is the work/find of Ioannis Sakellerakis)

rogueclassicism: 1. n. an abnormal state or condition resulting from the forced migration from a lengthy Classical education into a profoundly unClassical world; 2. n. a blog about Ancient Greece and Rome compiled by one so afflicted (v. "rogueclassicist"); 3. n. a Classics blog.